New navigation, autopilot and radar.

About Time

About Time

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10 Sep 2014
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Hi,

I have a compele Simrad set up on my Windy 37 (2003) today but plan an upgrade. My boatshop suggest Garmin but should like to hear if I should choose differently. I have been happy with the Simrad but Garmin seems to earn marketshare ... at least you see them all over. I am willing to pay extra if quality of a brand is better. The Simrad has worked perfectly for 20 years. Never an issue.
 
Plenty of opinions on this. I would choose Garmin, and just have done on a new boat build. Much faster computers, much better user interface, much better support.
 
I would do garmin also but the new Raymarine stuff look ok ( not used it )

On a total wildcard I have the orca free app and if it very good. They don’t ( I think ) support radar but you can interface it to autopilot etc.

It might be ahead of its time but I can see it becoming the way of the world. On line. Weather. Tides. Graphic etc etc
 
I recently upgraded to Raymarine Axiom and Raymarine Quantum radar. Works well but I went for wireless communication between the MFD and radar which I guess Garmin will offer too. But my advice is don’t bother as there is no advantage (for our size of boat) and always those few seconds delay while it “handshakes” which are “fingers crossed” moments but thankfully have worked 100% (so far)
 
I fitted a Raymarine Axiom 9 with the RMK-10 remote keypad/controller earlier this year. The best location for my Axiom was on a panel at the front of the dashboard but I would have to get out of the drivers seat every time I needed to zoom or press the screen. I mounted the RMK controller beside the wheel and it’s fantastic.
Can’t fault the Raymarine stuff. I fitted an i40 speed and depth also.
Next on the list is an autopilot upgrade.
 
Thanks PaulR and JFM, been mulling this over for a while.
Previous boat had an old Garmin setup which worked perfectly and was intuitive to use.
New boat(to us) has a Raymarine setup which drives me up the wall with the layers of commands and silly lack of communication between the various components. I am sure that a good Raymarine guy could probably sort it but they aren't around West Wales.
Also it just is not so intuitive or easy to use as the garmin.
Hey ho- BOAT (Break Out Another Thousand) or 5.
 
I went for Axiom and converted the boat to hydraulic steering for autopilot but use the Navionic (Garmin) charts. My primary driver for moving from Garmin to Raymarine was the autopilot and Navionic dock to doc feature combination. Both of which I find to be excellent and imo best in class. I can control the boat via mobile phone or tablet from the lower cockpit while the wife keeps watch and simple enough to use that she is comfortable taking the helm if and when necessary to make traffic and obstacle course corrections. I will confess my old Garmin had superb after sales support. But it was also expensive.
 
PS. Raymarine have a ton of product and instructional videos with a youtube channel that has regular live sessions and updates. Watch a few of these to get a feel of what you want to get from or out of your equipment
 
BruceK said:
I went for Axiom and converted the boat to hydraulic steering for autopilot but use the Navionic (Garmin) charts. My primary driver for moving from Garmin to Raymarine was the autopilot and Navionic dock to doc feature combination. Both of which I find to be excellent and imo best in class. I can control the boat via mobile phone or tablet from the lower cockpit while the wife keeps watch and simple enough to use that she is comfortable taking the helm if and when necessary to make traffic and obstacle course corrections. I will confess my old Garmin had superb after sales support. But it was also expensive.
Click to expand...
Unless i'm missing something, you get everything you describe above with an all Garmin setup, without having to spend extra on Navionics charts. My electronics are all Garmin, including a hydraulic autopilot. I can touch a spot on the plotter and select "Goto" and the plotter invites me to engage the autopilot, all from the plotter screen. I can select a route from my saved routes and engage the autopilot from the plotter screen and the autopilot follows the route.

With the Active Captain app' installed on a phone or tablet i can also do all of the above, or use a phone or tablet as a stand alone backup to the plotter. The app' uses my Garmin charts, so no need to pay extra for Navionics.
 
Fair enough, I was working from a price point as well and unless I cocked up which wouldnt be the first time I did a full conversion including hydraulic steering for under 3k. YMMV
 
A personal preference issue I acknowledge but we went for Raymarine as I don’t particularly like the Garmin stuff on boats at work and I wasn’t keen on a Garmin plotter that came with a previous boat. I like the Raymarine set-up and like Dino I found being able to leave one Axiom on the chart table angled towards the helm with a remote RMK controller at the helm an excellent solution.
 
A couple of niggles on my Raymarine Axiom
When I rent a buoy in a cala, they give me the coordinates to find it in one form. The Raymarine Axiom only gives one option for the coordinates form. Of course the other form. I then have to do some simple maths (or use a website) to do the conversion.
Raymarine know about this and it’s got to be the simplest programming to give options but I guess they are holding back for it to be released as part of a major upgrade.

The other niggle is the resetting of XTE is not available on all dashboards. You have to go to another dashboard, reset, then go back to the dashboard you are using.
Raymarine have known about this one for years

Await exciting major upgrade announcement…….sometime???
 
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